In my experience there are two distinct groups of us that print; those that have focused on their photography work as a source of income and as such are printing on a regular basis and those like myself where it is an obsession but not something where we have enough demand to print several times a week.
Most of my printing is to just knock out a print of an image I've just finished and like for myself or my family members use. Occasionally a friend will ask me for a print and I do one as a gift. I go through spells where I'll get wrapped up in working on 2 or 3 of my files and finally get them to a point that I'm satisfied and want a print. Them I may go off on a tangent with one of my other obsessions, say flying R/C gliders, and not get back to photography for four or five weeks.
Now, I could send my files off to a shop to be printed BUT being the Poster Child for the N.American Anal Retentive we know I'd never be happy with their work! Thus I'm stuck with doing it myself.
Being 90+% of my work is B&W printing, some panoramas, there are just two issues a printer must meet for me to be satisfied:
1. Outstanding B&W print, with excellent color for the times I'm needing it.
2. Ability to forget the printer for up to 5 weeks and still have it function properly when I return. (OK, if I have to I could set an alert in the computer to remind me to do a text print every 2.5 weeks just to exercise the printer.)
I've read at length the hundreds of pages here where folks have spent large amounts of time, money and frustration with the new gen of Epsons. On a relative basis, that does not seem to exist for Canon.
I had the Epson 4800 for several years and it rarely clogged up on me. But we moved last fall and I sold it. Part of not having any problem with the Epson may have been contributed to by the high humidity of where we were living at the time - Naples, FL. Now in Chapel Hill, NC and in the winter it takes a humidifier on the furnance to keep the house at just 30% humidity.
In short, how about quality of B&W prints on the Canon verse the Epson?